Vices
by readerofasaph
Summary: Shortfic.  While soloing as a freelance bodyguard, Killua comes face-to-face with Hisoka.


Gambling was a Very Bad Idea. Mito-san had thoroughly convinced Killua of this the last time he and Gon had visited Whale Island, depriving him of dessert (the cruelty!) for three nights in a row until he promised never to do it again. He'd left her home repentant and reformed, a new man (well, teenager), never again requiring Gon to knock him unconscious and carry him away from whatever game of chance had caught his fancy this time.

Yeah, right.

Well, it hadn't been such a problem when Gon had been around to knock him unconscious, instead of wandering the snowy northern steppes with Ging, participating in some exotic reindeer hunt that _most definitely did not include Killua,_ Gon's father had specified with a smirk. That old man had no idea how to act his age.

Of course Killua could have gone with them if he'd wished; Gon would have insisted once he saw that Killua really wanted to come, and Ging was only slightly better at saying no to Gon than Killua was. But an indefinite period of playing games of one-upmanship with Ging Freecs (in freezing cold weather) while Gon remained deliberately and determinedly oblivious somehow didn't hold the appeal for Killua that it'd used to.

Ging kept _winning_ those games, for one thing.

Besides, there were things Killua could do by himself when Gon wasn't around.

Like say, taking the next airship to York Shin and spending the subsequent forty-eight hours hitting every casino in the city.

By the time the attendants at the last place realised he was underaged and decided to throw him out, he'd already lost five million jenis, which put him back in debt in a way he hadn't been since meeting the little old lady with a knitting hobby on the Hunter Committee who'd challenged him to Janken.

He'd outrun the debt collectors quite easily, but then he'd had to deal with the fact that he had no available cash left, which meant no food, and more importantly, no sweets. Plus if he took too long paying back the debt, there was always the possibility that they'd start sending letters to his contact addresses, which meant Mito-san just _might_ hear about this, which meant the the end of the world pretty much. Certainly it meant Killua could give up on tasting her triple chocolate fudge cake ever again.

Killua had considered his options then. The last time he'd gambled away his Hunter license they'd had a hell of a time getting it back. Loan sharks were never a good idea, a lesson Killua had learned through bitter experience. (They stopped sending flunkeys to collect interest from you after you'd permanently crippled the first three or four lots, but Gon always looked so reproachful when Killua did that.)

That left – working for money.

He'd gone to the city's classiest hotel and tried to spot the wealthiest-looking individual he could find.

"Hey, old man," he said. "Give me a job."

The school of dark-suited bodyguards surrounding the businessman had glowered and reached for their weapons (one or two of the better ones hadn't, just watched warily). He'd dangled the Hunter license in front of them, and they subsided, several still glaring.

Their corpulent middle-aged employer had sized Killua up with an eye more suited to evaluating stock market trends than fighting ability. But he seemed to appreciate bloodlust when he saw it. "How much do you want, and how famous are you?"

"More famous than you," Killua replied, "and this many zeroes for a week." He held up six fingers plus a thumb.

"Done." He'd held out his hand. "I have a conference to attend this whole week, and many of my rivals will be there. It will impress them, having a professional Hunter in my entourage."

Three days later, Killua was _bored to death_.

They were in a mansion on the outskirts of York Shin, supposedly a conference centre popular with city's financial elite. It had a swimming pool, a sauna, a gym, a mini-cinema, all of which Killua had sampled extensively by the end of the second day.

The chief bodyguard didn't take too kindly to Killua's enthusiastic use of the recreational facilities. "Hey kid. You're supposed to stick close to the boss. How can you do that if you're off doing whatever you like?"

"It's all right," Killua said, checking his teeth for cavities in a polished decorative mirror. "If anyone threatens the boss, I'll get there before anything happens to him." Unless it was a Zaoldyeck assassinating him, of course, in which case nothing could be done for the poor bastard anyway. "Does anyone know where to get chocolate around here?"

The chief seemed annoyed, but didn't say anything else. He was one of the few people here who who had any inkling of Killua's level of ability. The rest of the bodyguards still detested Killua, which was par for the course. They gathered in one corner of the foyer, puffing on cigarettes and complaining about various aspects of their lives. One of them was reading a girlie magazine. Killua wondered if the man would surrender it up if sufficiently threatened, then decided against doing it. Not only Mito-san, but Gon too, probably, would disapprove, and his stock of Good Behaviour Points was getting awfully meagre as it was.

The chief's walkie-talkie buzzed and he picked it up. A breathy, panicky voice emitted from the transceiver.

"Hey, we need backup! Something horrible just came in the front gate ...guards killed..." . The sentence broke off; the static worsened, and mingled with a thudding sound and a bloodcurdling scream. About half the bodyguards blanched; two men put out their cigarettes. The chief's face hardened.

"Jennings, Natsuba. We're heading out," he said, nodding at two of the more competent men. Jennings reached for his gun-holster, looking anticipatory. Natsuba gulped audibly.

"Wait," Killua said, "Let me go. This seems interesting."

Several men muttered, and one was bold enough to say: "Yeah, let Wonder Boy go. Isn't that what he's being paid for?"

Killua heard murmurs of assent as he threw open the balcony doors, but didn't bother to pick up what they were saying. He stepped onto the balustrade and leaped down, into the night.

The air smelled sweet, of blood and danger. There was another scream, and the faint sound of sobbing. It wasn't a professional, then – either that, or a professional who took an inappropriate quantity of pleasure in his work.

Only one hostile presence. One with incredible nen and killing desire. He walked forward quietly, all senses alert.

Was it just him, or did that aura seem rather familiar? Like, kind of sticky and sweet, maybe?

Killua felt a sinking feeling in his chest.

As he passed by the fountain that decorated the main driveway, a sensor light flicked on, and he and Hisoka came face to face with each other, surrounded by brightness and lengthened shadows.

From the nearby trees that bordered the front lawn, a flock of sparrows scattered in alarm, and dozens of small animals scampered through the darkness for cover.

Then Hisoka beamed. "Killua."

His speech very definitely sounded like it was laced with hearts.

"Uh," said Killua, "What are you doing here?"

"Looking for you."

"For me?" Killua tried to catalogue his personal qualities that would lead to Hisoka wanting to look for him, discovered a distressing number of them, and then remembered the most important one. "Ah, Gon!"

"Gon," Hisoka agreed. "He's ripened quite nicely by now, don't you think? You have too, by the way," he added, by way of a generous compliment.

"No thanks," Killua muttered. "Erm, do you think you could stop looking at me with that expression?"

"What expression?"

"The one where you can't decide whether I'm a peach or a new variety of lollipop? That one."

"Ah," said Hisoka, sounding disappointed, and toned down the bloodlust just a little. Now he only gave off the impression of wanting to rip out Killua's throat.

Killua decided to ruin his day. "Gon's on the other side of the world. Hunting carnivorous reindeer with his dad."

For one fleeting moment, there was a sense of thwarted murderous frustration so awful that Killua grabbed his yo-yos without thinking about it, ready to swing, electrical nen-aura spreading all over his body.

Then Hisoka said, "Oh," turned around, and began walking away.

Two more security guards got murdered on Hisoka's way out, which Killua decided was probably an inevitable sacrifice.

Something occurred to him. Hisoka hadn't even stopped to play, which meant that meant that he was probably serious about fighting Gon this time.

Wait. That was bad news, wasn't it?

Without really thinking about it he started heading towards the exit. Forget about paying his debts. He could always steal candy to eat anyway, and he needed to warn Gon that Hisoka was coming. If he stole on board the next airship, he could be in the snowy steppes by this time tomorrow.

Although really, if Gon decided to fight Hisoka and ended up dying in the process, there was very little Killua could do about it.

He would just have to kill Hisoka afterwards, that was all.

He broke into a run even before he reached the gates.

He was going to be there, regardless of whether Gon needed him or not.


End file.
